Stephen King has made no secret of the
fact that he prefers the mini-series adaptations of his work over the
film versions. He feels that novels are written more in the style of
a television series than films, with “chapters” representing the
time between commercial breaks, and “Books” or “Parts”
representing episodes. I'm not sure what he thinks about the ongoing
TV series based on his work. I can say that I have enjoyed what I've
seen of The Dead Zone TV series, probably more than I enjoyed
the movie. Still, I can't help but imagine what a Mick Garris
mini-series would be like, giving the story lines time to play out,
but without a lot of filler.
Why do I bring this up? Because to me,
The Dead Zone movie feels extremely rushed. Our protagonist,
John Smith (Christopher Walken), goes into a coma after a car
accident and wakes up years later to find he now has psychic visions.
Then, he has to help a sheriff hunting a serial killer. Finally, he
has to try to assassinate a politician destined to bring about
nuclear war when he's elected President.
Right there you have a perfect
three-episode structure which has all been crammed into an hour an
forty-five minutes. There are some great epiphany moments that
advance the plot, but the human element seems lacking. Most of the
character development goes to Johnny and his attempts to deal with
what he is, leaving these other events in which he plays a role
woefully underdeveloped as anything more than plot devices.
We never feel the clock ticking down as
Johnny tries to locate the killer, finding him is far too easy. And
when Johnny buys a rifle and goes to kill Greg Stilson (Martin
Sheen), it seems like a decision he came to with surprising speed and
little mental anguish. I checked the timer, he finds out about the
nuclear Apocalypse within the last 20 minutes of the movie, and from
there moves directly to planning Stilson's death.
While it's been years since I've seen
the show, I find myself mentally comparing this movie to a filler
episode in the series. In that episode, Johnny received a blood
transfusion from several people, and as a result, had a vision of one
of them dying. He spent the whole episode trying to track them down
and touching each of their lives, only for a man he'd inspired as a
writer to step in and save the female bike messenger who would
otherwise have been hit by a truck. Cheesy as it was, the message
there was clear; this story is as much about the people whose lives
are affected by Johnny as about Johnny himself. However, this movie
is purely Johnny.
Walken's performance here works well.
I usually think Walken does his best work in comedy, because of his
tendency to be stilted and awkward. Here though, he's portraying a
man who gained psychic powers through brain damage. It makes sense
that he would come across as weird.
Martin Sheen really steals every scene
he's in. He's a sleazy politician, and he loves being exactly that.
I wish he had more direct interactions with Walken, but I suppose
that's forgivable. There's no real reason for either of them to ever
really talk to the other. I suppose I give the movie points over the
show for that logic. The show gave us a Johnny and Stilson who found
constant excuses to talk, despite hating each other.
Of course, this all brings us to the
real question: Is it scary? It didn't leave me shaking in my boots,
but it did put me ill at ease. Johnny's inability to convince people
that he legitimately knows the future is off putting. However, that
idea in and of itself is something that's been done to death.
What scares me more is the idea of
someone like Johnny; someone who has knowledge of the future, and who
is willing to decide who does or doesn't deserve to live based on
crimes yet to be committed. Since his actions appear to be the only
thing that can change the future, presumably he is the only one of us
with true free will. The idea that one person gets to judge you for
what you will do, and is absolutely justified in that... yes, that
terrifies me.
I do recommend this movie. Not as
strongly as many on this list, but I recommend it nonetheless. It's
a well-acted, well-directed movie that you won't regret seeing.
Interestingly, this is one of the few
reviews I've done where I don't spoil the ending, mainly because I
don't see any particular reason to do so. It just left me thinking
“...yes, that's an ending.” It didn't greatly affect how I
thought about anything else in the movie, so I don't see any reason
to talk about it.
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